


we’ll be a fine line (we’ll be alright)

by elephantbag



Category: SHINee
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Gender Dysphoria
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-20
Updated: 2019-12-20
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:07:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,049
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21876370
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elephantbag/pseuds/elephantbag
Summary: His entire livelihood hinges on pretense, putting on a smile that looks just bright enough, giving out answers that sound just honest enough to be believable. This kind of pretense is different.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 26





	we’ll be a fine line (we’ll be alright)

**Author's Note:**

> Inspiration and title taken from Harry Styles’ title track “Fine Line.” I’m not Taemin and I’ve no idea what his real feelings are. This work is an outsider’s musings and, as I’ve come to find out recently, a lot of projection. Thank you to my friends for being so encouraging and to my beta for being so lovely. Enjoy ♡

He grows up under the attention and scrutiny of the public, with a childish haircut and a scrawny frame, all collarbones, elbows and wrists. He’s wide-eyed with just as much excitement and wonder as anxiety and trepidation. Everyone refuses to stop talking about how pretty he is.

He knows. He’s known since he was a small child. It carries more weight than he wishes it did.

He thinks it would have been easier if he looked more traditionally masculine. It would have been easier to ignore, easier to shake, easier to put away in some metaphorical box under lock and key. It would have been easier if his face were more angular, his cheeks less rounded, his cheekbones sharper, his lips smaller. If he were stronger, taller, broader.

He has no control over any of it, as much as he tries. He only loses the fat in his cheeks when he loses the rest of himself. He’d considered going under the knife to see if it would calm some of the turmoil that rages inside, but he found himself unable to commit to it.

For a while, he fights against it the only way he knows how to: he reinforces that he’s a man, that he’s masculine, that he’s handsome; he goes on variety shows and tells anecdotes about scaring ahjussis in public restrooms due to his long hair, deepening his voice to prove that he’s not a woman infiltrating their space, that he belongs there; he goes to the gym with Jonghyun and Minho despite his lack of interest in building muscle, hoping to change his image enough for others to take him seriously as a person, as a man. He wonders if he’s something that can be fixed if he gives it the correct amount of effort.

He’s existentially tired as he battles a daily war with himself. His entire livelihood hinges on pretense, putting on a smile that looks just bright enough, giving out answers that sound just honest enough to be believable. This kind of pretense is different. It takes so much out of him to go through the motions, pushing down words and emotions he can barely admit to himself, let alone to others. He looks online, finds information that will rattle inside his brain for days to come, terms he researches further while shaking like a leaf.

He quickly understands he has no idea what he is, but he knows what he’s not. He’s not a girl. There’s nothing wrong with being a girl, as much as he’s been so defensive about it in the past. It’s not him. It doesn’t sit right with him, makes his chest constrict in a way he dislikes.

He’s a man, he thinks, but it seems he’s not the right type of man. He’s not what the people around him expect a man to be. He’s not what he would expect a man to be. Too soft, too round, a distinct lack of hard planes and sharp angles. He’s interested in feminine things and it’s been that way since his childhood. He’s not sure what to do with it.

Their stylists put them in all sorts of new outfits and makeup: massive hats paired with flowy pants; bold, black eyeliner paired with small, delicate crystals. He wore skirts over his pants for previous comebacks and he gets to do it for this as well, long, flowing, beautiful. He wonders what it would be like to wear a skirt by itself and to do so completely seriously, no skits, no gimmicks, no dramatics.

It’s with his heart doing somersaults in his chest that he realizes that he wants too much, that he yearns for things he can’t have. He’s powered by ambition and dreams far bigger than his tiny body. It’s as troublesome as when he decided dancing wasn’t the only talent he wanted to be known and praised for. He keeps daydreaming about a self he doesn’t know, about a person he can’t be.

It’s about a different aspect of himself as well as a different person, one he thinks of in faraway, imaginary terms, like an idealized version of who he really wants to be. Still not a woman, but someone who walks between the lines that are already set, who can be both and neither, who encompasses everything and nothing. He likes makeup and he wants to play with it, see what it can do for him, how it can change him. He likes see-through and silken fabrics, blouses and leather jackets, skirts and skinny jeans. He wants all of it.

He’s the type of person who says something and does it. He’s never been the kind who makes empty promises, be it to himself or to others. What he wants, he gets. He decides this is part of it.

He makes a conscious effort to move forward, internally and externally. The first breakthrough comes in the form of his solo debut. He doesn’t have much input in the album itself or the concept of it, but he gets to have Jonghyun write him a song. He thinks of what he wants to say, what he wants the world to know about him. It fills his body with dread, but he figures it’s as good a start as he’ll ever get.

It’s difficult to discuss it with Jonghyun, to shape often unnameable feelings into something digestible. The words feel distorted in his mouth, the way his emotions feel too large inside his ribcage. In the end, he settles on something that is at the bare minimum a smidge of truth. There’s more to him than a pretty boy.

It’s the thing about him that calls people to him, that blesses his daydreams, that haunts his nightmares. He’s as pretty as a girl, he’s prettier than a girl, he’s not a girl. He’s too much for others to see him as a man, he’s not enough for others to see him as a woman, he’s just enough to be seen as Taemin.

His uniqueness is what he decides to bet on, to hold carefully in his hands like a gift. He's slowly learning that he can turn what he sees as his weakness into his strength. He begins to feel at home in his own skin.


End file.
